CHAPTER II THEORETICAL REVIEW
A. The Concept of Reading Comprehension
1. Reading
Students have to master the four basic languages of English which consist of listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Reading is considered as important skill. Students need good reading skill for acquiring knowledge and learning new information. They have to practice continually and extensively to develop reading.
a. The Concept of Reading
Nunan defines reading is a fluent process of readers combining information from a text and their own background knowledge to build meaning.1 So, reading take complex process in understanding the idea from the text deal with readers prior knowledge they have.
In accordance to Edwards Peter, Reading, however, is not merely word-calling. perceptual process must accompany the deciphering of graphic symbols. Dechant in Edwards states this admirably when he refers to the complete reading act being an involvement in which the reader brings meaning to the printed symbols through his cultural and experiential background. The perceptual
1David Nunan. Dynamic Text Comprehension An Integrative View of Reading, (New York: Phoenix ELT, 2003) , p.68
process involves seeing the printed word, recognizing the word, understanding its meaning, and relating the word to its context.2
Based on the explanation above, the writer concluded that the readers brings meaning as the lastest process of involvement in reading activity.
According to Hesham Suleiman, Reading can be seen as an
“interactive” process between a reader and a text which leads to automaticity or (reading fluency).3
Based on the definition above, it concluded that In this process, the reader interacts dynamically with the text as he/she tries to licit the meaning and where various kinds of knowledge are being used.
b. The Purpose of Reading
Reading serves multifaceted purposes. People read books for a variety of reasons. They read to comprehend a text and answer comprehension check questions, to do grammar activities, to solve language problems, to improve language ability, to achieve pleasure and information, to know the instruction of using a particular tool, to be familiar with a particular country or place, to decode message from a printed document, to get idea from inscription from any objects etc.
According to Ling in Arifuddin Hamra & Eny Syatriana The purpose of reading is students interact with the printed materials to get
2Peter Edwards. “Idioms and Reading Comprehension”, Journal of Reading Behavior.
(University of British Colombia),Vol 3/ VI , 1974,p.288
3Hesham Suleiman. “Teaching Reading Comprehension to ESL/EFL Learners”, Journal of Language and Learning , (Saudi Arabia: JLL), Vol.5/No.1,2006, p.64
appropriate meaning.4 In this case, the readers have to observe, interprete, and evaluate the printed pages. The process of getting meaning may be different among readers because of the previous knowledge and the purpose of reading the texts.
c. The Principle of Reading
In accordance to Harmer, there are some principles behind the teaching of reading:
1) Reading is not a passive skill. Reading is an incredibly active occupation. To do it successfully, we have to understand what the words mean.
2) Students need to be engaged with what they are reading. As with everything else in lessons, students who are not engaged with the reading text, actively, not interested in what they are doing, are less likely to benefit.
3) Students should be encouraged to respond to the content of a reading text, not just the language. It is important to study reading texts for the way they use language, the number of paragraph they contain and how many times they use relative clause.
4) Prediction is a major factor in reading. When we read texts in our own language, we frequently have a good idea of the context before we actually read.
4Arifuddin Hamra & Eny Syatriana. “A Model of Reading Teaching for University EFL Students: Need”, Journal of English Language Teaching, (Makassar : Canadian Center of Science and Education) Vol. 5, No. 10: 2012,p. 2
5) Match the task to the topic. Once a decision has been taken about what reading text the students are going to read, we need to choose good reading tasks, the right kind of questions, engaging and useful puzzle etc.
6) Good teacher exploit reading text to the full. They integrate the reading text into interesting class sequences, using the topic for discuss and further tasks, using the language for study and later activation.5
Based on the explanation above, it concluded that successful reading can be seen from the understanding the meaning from the text, then student need to accomplished the reading targed and guided by the good teacher to exploiting the reading text.
d. Type of Reading
There are two types of reading according to Hesham Suleiman.6
1) Extensive Reading
According to Hedge as quoted by Hesham Suleiman, Extensive reading helps greatly in “exposing” SL learners to English and especially when the class time is limited. Hedge briefs the advantages of extensive use in the following lines: Learners can build their language competence, progress in their reading ability,
5Jeremy Harmer, How to Teach English, (New York: Longman Press,2001), p.70.
6Hesham Suleiman. Op. Cit., p.66
become more independent in their studies, acquire cultural knowledge, and develop confidence and motivation to carry on learning.
Brown Doughlas state that Extensive reading (free voluntary reading, as Krasgen called it) is a key to students gain in reading ability,linguistic competence,vocabulary, spelling and writing7. Extensive reading is carried out to achieve a general understanding of a usually somewhat longer text (book,long article,or essay,etc). Most extensive reading is performed outside of classtime.8 In accordance to this statement, extensive reading as the multiple process including the important aspect in english just like vocabulary,spelling,meaning from the text but this is applying outside of the classtime.
2) Intensive Reading
In intensive (or creative) reading, students usually read a page to explore the meaning and to be acquainted with writing mechanisms. In intensive reading activities learners are in the main exposed to relatively short texts which are used either to exemplify specific aspects of the lexical, syntactic or discoursal system of the L2, or to provide the basis for targeted reading strategy practice.
7Brown Douglass. Teaching by Principles an Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy. (2nded). (Francise, 2000), p.301
8Ibid,p.313
Brown Doughlas State that intensive reading calls students attention to grammatical forms, discourse markers and other surface structure details for the purpose of understanding literal meaning , implications, rhetorical relationship, and the like.9 So, the intensive reading focus to the internal structure of reading text relate to the meaning of the text itself.
e. Teaching Reading at Senior High School
Teaching reading at senior high school is focused on the achievement of the competence, which can be shown on the students’
in comprehending the text. In further meaning, teaching reading is not merely reading and comprehending certain topic but also on the students’ competence in comprehending the text, such as how to use the prior knowledge and students’ experiences, how to comprehend the text, how to analyze the text and the paragraph.
Basic competence for reading is that the students are able to understand the meaning of the text and the arranging of rhetorical development in the written text, especially in narrative, procedure, hortatory, spoof, recount, report and news item. So, the writer would like to have an observation on the eleven grade students of senior high school.
9 Id, p.312